The dismissal of Mick McCarthy and appointment of Terry Connor as Wolves manager in February 2012 did not halt their slide. Photograph: Michael Mayhew/Sportsphoto/Allstar

A month ago Dean Saunders was talking about identifying loan players who could also be part of what he was building for the future at Wolverhampton Wanderers. Those plans, however, have been shelved. "Things have changed," the Wolves manager said this week. "I've got one thing on my mind now and that's staying up."

Lying 23rd in the Championship after picking up one win from their past 14 league matches, Wolves are threatening to write themselves into the record books by becoming the first club to suffer the ignominy of being relegated from the top flight to the third tier in successive seasons for a second time.

League One beckons unless they can turn things around in the final nine matches, starting with Saturday's crunch game against bottom-of-the-table Bristol City at Molineux, where Wolves have won four times in the past 15 months. That Wolves have had four managers during that period tells its own story and also goes some way to explaining why the supporters believe much of the blame rests with the owner, Steve Morgan. "Most Wolves fans would say we're struggling to think of a good football decision that he has made in the last 15 months. Every major call he has got wrong," says Charles Ross, editor of the former Wolves fanzine, A Load of Bull.

Speaking at a meeting with Wolves fans at the end of last month, Morgan said he would walk away from the club he bought from Sir Jack Hayward in 2007 if he felt that he was no longer wanted. The multimillionaire, who is chairman and founder of the house builder Redrow, apologised for the club's position and revealed it had taken a toll on his personal life.

When it came to the finances, though, Morgan went on the defensive. He said £73m had been splurged on players during his time at Molineux, with £37m recouped, putting Wolves among the top 10 clubs in terms of net spend. Another £18m went on the new Stan Cullis Stand, which seemed an odd decision at the time, and, at this rate, will provide pleasant surroundings for Crawley and Stevenage next season. As for questions about where the money has gone from the sale of players such as Matt Jarvis and Steven Fletcher last summer, Morgan said it had "been used to stop a £6m loss becoming a £12m, £13m or £14m loss".

With another £32m in parachute payments due in the next three years and a summer clearout likely to solve the problem of there being no pay-cut clauses in the wake of relegation to League One, the balance sheet appears less of a problem than the decision-making at the top that has contributed to poor managerial appointments. Jez Moxey, the chief executive who runs the club on a day-to-day basis, is respected in the game as a tough negotiator, but Wolves are crying out for a technical director to provide a clear strategy.

"Somebody like Graham Taylor needs to be at the football club," says Steve Froggatt, the former Wolves winger who now works as a BBC pundit. "Graham wouldn't be a threat to the manager because he doesn't want to manage any more. He would be a perfect person to sit at the top and introduce all the things that you need in place to run a club properly. Wolves have nobody on the board who can say: 'From a football perspective, I would like to say this.' Because none of them are football people."

Eager to get rid of "the Mick McCarthy culture", Solbakken felt the best way forward was to empower the players. Standards dropped, discipline disappeared – Bakary Sako went unpunished after reporting late for one game – and training lost its competitive edge, with some of the drills regarded as ridiculously basic. Johan Lange and Patrick Weiser, the assistant manager and first-team coach Solbakken brought in to work alongside him, had little authority.

When things started to go badly wrong on the pitch, Solbakken was reluctant to read the riot act, prompting Roger Johnson, whose own time at Wolves has been little short of a disaster, to confront the manager in the changing room during the run of three straight league defeats before the Luton game. Johnson, along with a few other players, felt that Solbakken needed to adopt a tougher line and urged him to point the finger. Solbakken, keen to avoid confrontation, refused.

If Solbakken's departure was inevitable, Saunders's arrival represented a surprise, in part because of the speed with which things happened but also because he was the only person interviewed. Sean O'Driscoll, who had been harshly dismissed by Nottingham Forest, was available, yet he never got a look in. O'Driscoll went on to take over at Bristol City, where he has picked up 17 points from his 11 games in charge. Saunders has eight points from the same number of matches.

Fans are curious where Morgan, a lifelong Liverpool fan, is getting his advice. There is little to suggest Moxey had much say in the recruitment of Solbakken or Saunders. Morgan is believed to have spoken to Jan Molby, the former Liverpool player, about Solbakken.

When it came to Saunders, whom Morgan knew beforehand, the Wolves owner said he "had references from his last two bosses [at Doncaster and Wrexham] and they said he was he was the best young manager in football".

With one win under his belt, Saunders is under increasing pressure, although Froggatt feels his former Aston Villa team-mate has been left in a difficult position. "To be fair to my mate, who I know is having a hard time of it, I just don't think he's had the necessary backing [in the transfer market].

"The team had been on an irreversible slide for a long period of time and Deano had identified what needed changing. I think the board must have thought: 'If we can get by to the end of this season, then we'll rebuild for next.' But having seen the team all year, they should have seen that it was bereft of confidence and ideas. It's almost that they've now decided to bring in one or two players well after the horse has bolted."

Whether or not Saunders is the right man for the job and however flawed the decision-making is in the boardroom, it is impossible to ignore the woeful performances from the players and their part in this mess. Other than the goalkeeper Carl Ikeme and Sako, it is hard to name anyone who emerges with any credit this season, which must be particularly galling for Morgan when he looks at the £25m wage bill.

Saunders is trying his best to see the glass as half full and believes four wins should keep Wolves in the division. It is hard, though, to imagine where those victories will come from at the moment. "It has to start with Bristol City," Froggatt says. "If Wolves get beat it's a disaster and I can't see them mentally recovering. Whereas if they win and they put on a good performance, they can build on it. So this is enormous for them."